Although statistical patterns associated with suicide suggest that blacks should be the least likely to commit suicide, black men between the ages of 18-25 do not conform to this pattern. The suicide rate for black males in this age group, which approximates and sometimes surpasses the rate for their white male cohorts, is more than three times higher than the rate for young adult black women. Analysis of death rates from suicide per 100,000 adult black population residing in approximately fifty metropolitan areas reveal that: (1) the gap between the suicide rates of males and females has been widening in every region of the country except the West; (2) rates have declined among metropolitan black females in each region of the country; among black males, rates have declined in the West and North Central regions and increased in the South and the Northeast. (Author/RLV)